


Normal Service Will Be Resumed Shortly

by TriffidsandCuckoos



Category: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Genre: Cases take a lot out of Dirk, Farah Black is not much better, Gen, Post-Canon, Random & Short, Short, Todd Brotzman is Bad at Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-29
Updated: 2020-04-29
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:21:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23917462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TriffidsandCuckoos/pseuds/TriffidsandCuckoos
Summary: After cases, Dirk always sleeps much longer than Todd thinks is normal. Not that he's worried, obviously. He just thinks it's weird.
Relationships: Farah Black & Todd Brotzman, Todd Brotzman & Dirk Gently
Comments: 6
Kudos: 39





	Normal Service Will Be Resumed Shortly

**Author's Note:**

> I have a lot of these odd DGHDA fragments hanging out on my computer. They do not connect to anything, although this is DGHDA so they might also connect to everything.
> 
> TFW you have to go up a rating from Gen because of two swearwords and then remember _Empire Strikes Back_ is a U.

Todd is a functioning sort of lazy. He complains about mornings and goes out of his way (ironically) to get out of plans, but it's not like he actually spends all his time in bed. Even when he was at his peak in asshole terms he was never just sleeping when he took the day off. (Okay, so maybe sometimes he stared at the ceiling a lot. That apartment was almost as shit as the Ridgely, so you had to keep an eye on that one water stain in case it unleashed a J-Horror movie.) He is, therefore, completely unprepared for Dirk's utter and unquestionable unconsciousness the day after a case closes.

For obvious reasons, he missed the fallout from their first case (and possibly would have anyway, what with the whole lying screaming on the floor outside the bathroom _thing_ ); their second case consisted of _so much_ (nothing in particular, just a lot of it) that sleeping forever seemed like a legitimate choice. It was only by their third, fourth, fifth cases that he started noticing an actual pattern. A really, really concerning pattern, honestly.

"Is he dead?" he asks, leaning against the doorframe and watching their resident Sleeping Holistic (he was not thinking about 'Holistic Beauty').

Farah leans back a little, as if the look she’s giving him requires a much wider aspect ratio. Maybe she thinks if she zooms out enough she'll get some helpful narration from a soft-spoken old British guy. (That happened once. Dirk had been delighted and Farah had never looked so interested in finding out about someone. Todd had done his utmost to just sidle out of view, duck, and on one occasion dive behind some bushes. He has no interest in meeting a narrator, his own or anyone else's, because if nothing else he already has more than enough bullshit buzzing in his brain as it was.)

"Do you think he's dead?" she asks in response, although her question mark sounds suspiciously like a period in disguise. (Reading Farah's narration had taken way too high a reading level. At least with Dirk you just had to read fast and keep an open mind when it came to metaphors.)

"No. Wait, do you?"

"No. I'm just concerned that you might." She narrows her eyes. "You do know what a dead body looks like, right?"

Todd took a sip of his coffee. "I hate that these are my conversations now."

"I'm just concerned about the level of comprehension I'm dealing with here." Possibly she's joking. Or at least making a joke. How is it Tina gets Farah all relaxed and communicating and Todd gets, well, Farah being Farah as far as he's concerned? Does he just encourage people not to relax? Is that a thing? "You've seen a couple of dead bodies now – "

"Thanks for reminding me."

" – so I'd hope you could tell when you're looking at one."

Todd exhales heavily, knocking his head very lightly against the doorframe and restraining himself from just pummelling himself into unconsciousness. Maybe he could be okay with his disease if just once it got him _out_ of an awkward conversation rather than into one. "I just meant – " He sighs again, redundantly. "Never mind."

"He'll wake up, Todd. He's just recharging."

"He's a person, not a phone," Todd says, which is meant as a sarcastic mutter and comes out a lot more distressed than ideal. "I don't get what the problem is."

"The problem being that he needs sleep? He does a lot, Todd. We all decompress differently."

That’s true. Farah, for example, goes jogging. Todd had been appalled when he'd found this out, obviously. She’d claimed doing all the same things they do on cases but in controlled environments calms her. (And then Dirk had had a not fun reaction to the overheard phrase 'controlled environments' so at least Todd didn't have to defend his own method of staring at daytime TV and pondering his sanity in all seriousness.)

"This is a lot of sleep, though. Like, ten hours is weird enough. This is _the entire day_."

"So speak to him about it."

"No, I – " Todd dodges the suggestion of a discussion about feelings with the grace and poise of a sociopathic ballet dancer (which is to say most ballet dancers). "I'm just worried about _him_ , that's all. Given, you know..." He trails off in the hope that Farah _does_ know and can do all the verbal and conceptual heavy lifting for him.

Farah leaves, which isn't helping and is in fact sort of the opposite, but at least that conversation is over.

Todd sighs, wandering over and sitting on the side of the bed. First time he did this, it had felt pretty creepy, except everything else in their lives is getting really codependent so maybe they left standard creepy behind a while ago. Besides, as much as Dirk doesn't wake up, Todd does like the soft noises he makes when Todd strokes his fingers through his air, leaning into the touch.

"I could take pictures," Farah's voice says.

"Don't you dare."


End file.
